The installation of measures to help households cut their energy use has ‘crashed’ in the last year, a campaign group has warned.

The number of measures installed collapsed by 60 per cent in the past year, from 1.65 million to 661,000, according to the Energy Bill Revolution campaign.

It warned that the installation of measures, which include cavity wall, solid wall and loft insulation and new boilers, could fall even further over the next year, by as much as another quarter.

Drop: There has been a significant fall in the installation of key energy efficiency measures, including cavity wall insulation (CWI), loft insulation (LI) and solid wall insulation (SWI), according to the report

The Energy Bill Revolution urged an overhaul of the government’s strategy to make our housing stock warmer, warning that the UK has one of the highest rates of fuel poverty in Western Europe, with an average of 25,000 people dying of the cold each winter.

It said that millions of households still need energy efficiency measures installed, at a time when installation rates could fall to their lowest level for more than a decade.

As many as 13million households do not have energy saving condensing boilers, five million could still benefit from cavity wall insulation and 7.5 million need loft insulation.

The Energy Bill Revolution and the Association for the Conservation of Energy, which conducted the research, warned that the fall is down to flaws in the government’s initiatives such as the Green Deal loan programme, which provides loans to households for installing energy saving measures.

It also criticised the decisions to relax the Energy Company Obligation in a bid to reduce household energy bills and to axe the Warm Front scheme, which it said was the only Government-funded energy efficiency programme for poor households.

It warned that the existing programmes were failing to tackle fuel poverty and would miss recommended targets from the Government's advisory Committee on Climate Change for insulating all remaining cavity walls and lofts by 2015, and 2.2 million solid walls by 2022.

The alliance of 180 charities, businesses and unions campaigning to end fuel poverty has called for home energy efficiency to be made a UK infrastructure investment priority.

‘The Government must make home energy efficiency an infrastructure investment priority to put the funding in place to end this scandal once and for all.’

While there has been an increase in boiler installations, the installation of cavity wall, loft and solid wall insulation has declined, the Energy Bill Revolution said

He added: ‘What's unique about energy efficiency is it does more than any other energy policy about energy security, fuel poverty and carbon emissions.

‘It has a multiplicity of benefits.’

All six million low income homes should be raised to a decent level of energy efficiency, judged as scoring a C grade on their energy performance certificate (EPC), by 2025, which would require more than trebling the number of measures being installed each year, the group said.

Extra costs should not be put on consumer bills, but revenue from carbon taxes levied on generators for the pollution they created should be used to provide long-term funding for energy efficiency, the campaign group added.

The number of Green Deal assessments has followed an upward trajectory over the last year, according to DECC

A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: ‘694,000 homes are now warmer and cheaper to run thanks to energy-saving measures installed under the Green Deal and the energy company obligation (ECO).’

He said the Government had extended the support given through ECO to 2017, giving clarity to the industry and supply chain.

And he said: ‘Our new Green Deal Home Improvement Fund, offering money back for making energy efficient home improvements, has already seen £16.5million issued in the first three weeks.’

Shadow energy and climate change secretary Caroline Flint said: ‘The most sustainable way to cut people's energy bills for the long-term is to invest in insulation and save the energy that escapes through our windows, walls and rooftops.

‘These figures show that not only has David Cameron failed to stop the energy companies from overcharging, the number of households getting help to insulate their homes has also collapsed.

‘This terrible reduction in insulation measures could not have come at a worse time. Because of David Cameron's failure to tackle energy bills people are desperate for help, but the Government's energy efficiency schemes clearly are not working.

‘That's why the next Labour Government will freeze energy bills for 20 months, reform the energy market, and help households make the energy efficiency improvements we so desperately need.’